Andrei Ruckenstein is a Professor and Chair of the Department of Physics at Boston University. After receiving his PhD and spending two years in the Theoretical Physics Group at AT&T Bell Laboratories, he held faculty positions at the University of California, San Diego, and at Rutgers University, where he was the founding Director of BioMaPS, an initiative focused on interdisciplinary research in biology at the interface with the mathematical and physical sciences. He has previously served as Vice President and Associate Provost for Research at Boston University.
Among numerous other research, enterprise and advisory involvements, Ruckenstein is co-founder of the Aspen Science Center—a non-profit organization promoting K-12 science education and public understanding of science—and is Chair of the Strategy and Budget Committee of the Board of CASIS, a Congress-designated not-for-profit which manages research and entrepreneurial activities on the International Space Station National Laboratory.
Dr. Ruckenstein is a theoretical condensed matter physicist by training, whose research interests were focused on the study of collective effects in atomic gases at low temperature and the physics of strongly correlated many-body systems, with application to low dimensional semiconductors, heavy fermions, and non-Fermi liquid behavior and superconductivity of the oxide high temperature superconductors. More than a decade ago his research direction shifted to biological physics, an area that would be more appropriately described as “Biology from a Physicist’s Perspective”. His biology research has been concerned with understanding the mechanisms governing the behavior of RNA polymerase, the molecular motor that transcribes the genetic information encoded in DNA into RNA. He is the recipient of a Sloan Fellowship, an ONR Young Investigator Award, and a Senior Humboldt Prize, and he is a Fellow of the American Physical Society.
He is a faculty affiliate of Kilachand Honors College, and member of the internal advisory board of ARROWS, an initiative of the Office of the Provost to Advance, Recruit, Retain & Organize Women in STEM.
Learn about his most recent research and campus activities at his profileon BU’s Department of Physics webpage.
